What a difference 10 years makes. I remember
back in ’95 it was damn near impossible to find a
thong shot of a model like Bria Myles, short of looking
in a magazine like Players or finding a copy of
Howard Morehead’s infamous
Bronze Beauties calendar (and those
women were not Bria Myles calibre). There was no
internet back then. And even if there was, there
weren’t any black women on it. I took the photo
above of model/actress Tanya Baetz for The Darker Image Calendar
back in ’95 and it made a lot of waves at the
time. So much so that she was asked on the
Jenny Jones Show to talk
about it, where she proclaimed “My butt is the
most talked about butt in LA!” And it probably
was, because that sort of thing was hardly seen
in those days, much less in Barnes & Noble
bookstore.

I think we would all agree that Tanya’s photo is
modest by comparison to what we’re seeing today,
however, which Kedesha Ferguson’s photo on
the right typifies. Don’t get me wrong, I love
the black woman’s shape (and for the record, I
like that Ferguson photo). In fact, back in ’95
I was trying every line possible to get women
like Kedesha to wear a thong, but it never
worked. But now I’m starting to wish for the old
days. The days when we all knew 40” hips were a
thing of wonder, but could only see it undressed
if we earned that right. I mean too
much of anything can desensitize you to it, and
I don’t wanna be desensitized to women that look
like Melyssa Ford. I also don’t want people to
get the impression that this is all beautiful
black women who want to model are good for - ass
shots. So I guess this is yet another post
bemoaning the state of urban modeling and asking
everyone who is a part of it to be cognizant of
your role. Don’t just go with flow. Change it
up. Improve the situation, or in another 5 years
you may be out of work.